KISS for charging batteries

[Snapperhappy]

Thanks again for all the info fellas. I now have a much clearer understanding on how to go about recharging batteries. I think Aussiedigs is right on the money with his setup. I had starter motor replaced in the Hilux yesterday and asked cost of dual battery system and electrical mechanic said $2000. That's a lot of dough for what i want to recharge. Anyway time to get busy and buy parts for solar recharge system. Thanks . Mark

 

[ctxkid]

those on a budget & charging gear off their starter battery should contemplate at least carrying a battery jump-pack or other emergency backup.
Even a small cheap 12V SLA battery can be used (whats in a lot of cheap jump-pack units). Also pays to make sure your vehicle is running well & starts easy.

you should never budget in mind when setting up a reliable setup

 

[Ridge Runner]

Mate if you want to get out of it as cheap as possible just get a portable 100/200 solar panel and hook it up to a spare battery and get a cheap 300 / 500 watt inverter, AND/OR one of those 12v Cigar multi socket setups and put some Crocodile clips on it to hook it up to the battery and that will get the job done until you can afford a proper setup,

I have something like that for moving from vehicle to vehicle and I also have a proper setup, But some times all I need is just the fridge and the battery and a solar panel with a cheap controller,

If you just want to get by then you don't need to spend big bucks, I bought a Battery box with external 12v posts and a Cigar lighter socket and a 115Ah deep cycle battery and I can hook a solar panel on to it and it will run for weeks if I don't try and run the whole world off of it, In cooler temps it will run my fridge for 6+ days without the solar panel but in the warmer weather it varies around 3 days or so.

hope that helps,

 

[Redfin]

you should never budget in mind when setting up a reliable setup

Spot on, like going to a restaurant, if you need to look at the prices, you shouldn't be there.

Do it once, do it right.

 

[Ridge Runner]

you should never budget in mind when setting up a reliable setup

Spot on, like going to a restaurant, if you need to look at the prices, you shouldn't be there.

Do it once, do it right.

That only works if we all have the same resources, Which we don't, So we all try and get by the best we can, Most of us tend to start off small and work our way up to a full blown system I know I did, I first started messing with solar back in the 1990's, Now I have enough battery power to last me 2 or 3 weeks without charging, Along with solar battery chargers for AA and AAA cells plus my 12v gear,

Those Items you posted is how I first started off.

 

[condor22]

Re the laptop - I didn't say my laptop chews 480W, what I said was that the 240VAC adaptor rated at 2 amps (V x A = W) could draw up to 480W.

A 240VAC power pack does 2 things, 1. operates the laptop, 2. charges the laptop battery (one at a time or both at the same time depending on the laptop battery SOC.

My point was to highlight that running a laptop from 240VAC through an inverter is much much, more costly on a source battery than running a 12VDC power pack.
If I had a larger inverter, I could test my laptop's requirements and publish the results, but as I've said before, my only normal inverter requirement for 240VAC is for the ultrasonic gold cleaner and that works well from a 150W inverter. Pretty well all the rest are 12 or 5VDC. The only 240VAC items I normally run over that are the van M/wave and water otter and they are genny sized loads

Snapper - it is also as much about process as it is about equipment. Here's what I did when I first used my GPX battery; Plug it in to the car first thing in the morning, especially if you drive to your detecting area. If you break for lunch, put it back on the car while you eat (accessory on, engine off will not flatten your car) Then at the end of the day driving back to camp, plug it into the car.

You can do the same with the laptop and phones and you will find that after dark charging times are minimal as most of your charging has been done. Regular small charging of the GPX battery will not harm it.

 

[Ridge Runner]

Re the laptop - I didn't say my laptop chews 480W, what I said was that the 240VAC adaptor rated at 2 amps (V x A = W) could draw up to 480W.

A 240VAC power pack does 2 things, 1. operates the laptop, 2. charges the laptop battery (one at a time or both at the same time depending on the laptop battery SOC.

My point was to highlight that running a laptop from 240VAC through an inverter is much much, more costly on a source battery than running a 12VDC power pack.
If I had a larger inverter, I could test my laptop's requirements and publish the results, but as I've said before, my only normal inverter requirement for 240VAC is for the ultrasonic gold cleaner and that works well from a 150W inverter. Pretty well all the rest are 12 or 5VDC. The only 240VAC items I normally run over that are the van M/wave and water otter and they are genny sized loads

Snapper - it is also as much about process as it is about equipment. Here's what I did when I first used my GPX battery; Plug it in to the car first thing in the morning, especially if you drive to your detecting area. If you break for lunch, put it back on the car while you eat (accessory on, engine off will not flatten your car) Then at the end of the day driving back to camp, plug it into the car.

You can do the same with the laptop and phones and you will find that after dark charging times are minimal as most of your charging has been done. Regular small charging of the GPX battery will not harm it.

Thanks Condor.

You just made me realize that when it comes to using an inverter I tend to reach for the biggest one I got but the power it consumes is being wasted when I could use my smaller 310w inverter and save power to do the same job,

My laptop peaks out at around 62.3w on AC, But leaving them plugged in is where they chew power also, mine can eat 1.2w in standby mode but if it decides to float the battery they can consume 15/16+ watts and it might do that 2 or 3 times in a 24 hour period for an hour or two, So they can waste about 60w of power just in their sleep mode per 24hrs.

 

[Aussiedigs]

Mate if you want to get out of it as cheap as possible just get a portable 100/200 solar panel and hook it up to a spare battery and get a cheap 300 / 500 watt inverter, AND/OR one of those 12v Cigar multi socket setups and put some Crocodile clips on it to hook it up to the battery and that will get the job done until you can afford a proper setup,

I have something like that for moving from vehicle to vehicle and I also have a proper setup, But some times all I need is just the fridge and the battery and a solar panel with a cheap controller,

If you just want to get by then you don't need to spend big bucks, I bought a Battery box with external 12v posts and a Cigar lighter socket and a 115Ah deep cycle battery and I can hook a solar panel on to it and it will run for weeks if I don't try and run the whole world off of it, In cooler temps it will run my fridge for 6+ days without the solar panel but in the warmer weather it varies around 3 days or so.

hope that helps,

Yep, spot on. Sometimes people over think all this. Thats fine, thats their choice. My Ebay sets are 10yrs plus old and still work flawless. I updated the cable, connectors and soldered everything to increase efficiency. The controller at $15 i listed i have as a spare yet ive never had to use it as yet.

KISS!

 

[Ridge Runner]

Yep, spot on. Sometimes people over think all this. Thats fine, thats their choice. My Ebay sets are 10yrs plus old and still work flawless. I updated the cable, connectors and soldered everything to increase efficiency. The controller at $15 i listed i have as a spare yet ive never had to use it as yet.

KISS!

Well I have a Victron MPPT charge controller which is over kill for most of my needs at the moment and I am saving that for when I get my panels sorted out, But my fridge on 12v uses 6 to 12 watts and hour, my portable TV uses 6 to 8 watts an hour, my 18650 charger uses about 60/70watts all up as does my AA charger and I also have Solar powered AA chargers and I have one of those 4 in 1 cigar lighter sockets that I hook up to one of those kickass type meters via the 12v posts on the batter box which still leaves the cigar socket free that is built in to the battery box as standard and that 115Ah battery is good for a total of 1380w and I have 3 of them plus an 85Ah in the truck.

But that battery box has power to spare and the solar AA chargers are great to have because I made sure that all my gadgets are powered by AA's and I can charge at leased 20 of them at any one time,

My main objective always has been to buy things that use off the shelf batteries and AA's are the most common types in the shops, And all these lithium types are all very well but when they go wrong ya stuffed, And although I have a couple of them I prefer to use AA's and I must have about 50/60 of rechargeable AA's, like you say KISS and that is a good way to think.

The moment you start adding new types of batteries in to your daily items then that's something else to worry about and another lot of charging, And I never buy detectors that don't use AA's and of coarse GPX's and GPZ's are another matter because they are a bit special but I would not buy a normal detector that does not use AA's, Factory battery packs are a curse and I avoid those type of machines like the plague. Where as AA's are available in every Town, Servo or supermarket in any country.

 

[condor22]

Just got back from 7 weeks in the GT. I have a Victron MPPT, 2 x 100W Sunsolar panels glued to the roof and a single 130AH AGM (My van fridge is on LPG)

It was bloody cold, so I ran the diesel heater from around 4pm to 9am the next day (17hours) watched 3-4 hours of TV and or ran the laptop off the van battery, plus a light or 2 etc. Also charged my GPX battery, 2 x Li oN 3.6v batteries for the SDC, wireless headphones, Tx for them, plus 2 x mobile phones. Oh, and the SP01 Enhancer.

I was constantly seeing % van battery SOC of between 74 and 76% first thing in the morning, so about 32AH per day to run all of that. The weather was mainly overcast, with some days just miserable drizzle and rain. On those days when back at camp, I noted my battery at 100% from the panels at between 1 and 3pm. So they are doing their job well. On one day I saw 61%, but that was because of 2 things, I accidently left the outside light on and used the laptop for too long at the same time as watching TV. Needed to run the genny for a while that day, lol.

Here's one instance where Energizers are not up to it. I have a wireless temperature gauge for the van (and the 4x4) They are an Ironman brand and consists of the receiver/digital display and a Tx in the fridge. Normal Energizers are fine for the Rx/gauge as it sits on a shelf at ambient temp. However the Tx in the fridge works at around 2 deg C and I noticed they very quickly deteriorated when so cold and would need replacing almost weekly. Eveready now do a AAA Lithium based Energizer (non rechargeable) that are designed to work in colder temps, they are not cheap, but the set I put in 8 weeks ago are still working strong. So I use normal Energizers in the RX and the Lithium in the Tx. It's "Horses for Courses"

 

[Jaros]

If using rechargeable batteries make sure they are good/very brands. I like Eneloop as they charge well and hold their charge on the shelf.
I have given up on Kogan rechargeables as they have a very short life.
Jaros

 

[Ridge Runner]

Just got back from 7 weeks in the GT. I have a Victron MPPT, 2 x 100W Sunsolar panels glued to the roof and a single 130AH AGM (My van fridge is on LPG)

It was bloody cold, so I ran the diesel heater from around 4pm to 9am the next day (17hours) watched 3-4 hours of TV and or ran the laptop off the van battery, plus a light or 2 etc. Also charged my GPX battery, 2 x Li oN 3.6v batteries for the SDC, wireless headphones, Tx for them, plus 2 x mobile phones. Oh, and the SP01 Enhancer.

I was constantly seeing % van battery SOC of between 74 and 76% first thing in the morning, so about 32AH per day to run all of that. The weather was mainly overcast, with some days just miserable drizzle and rain. On those days when back at camp, I noted my battery at 100% from the panels at between 1 and 3pm. So they are doing their job well. On one day I saw 61%, but that was because of 2 things, I accidently left the outside light on and used the laptop for too long at the same time as watching TV. Needed to run the genny for a while that day, lol.

Here's one instance where Energizers are not up to it. I have a wireless temperature gauge for the van (and the 4x4) They are an Ironman brand and consists of the receiver/digital display and a Tx in the fridge. Normal Energizers are fine for the Rx/gauge as it sits on a shelf at ambient temp. However the Tx in the fridge works at around 2 deg C and I noticed they very quickly deteriorated when so cold and would need replacing almost weekly. Eveready now do a AAA Lithium based Energizer (non rechargeable) that are designed to work in colder temps, they are not cheap, but the set I put in 8 weeks ago are still working strong. So I use normal Energizers in the RX and the Lithium in the Tx. It's "Horses for Courses"

That's impressive Charging times running all that lot, I might have to change my batteries for AGM's FLA DC's are just too slow at excepting the charge, But to achieve the same rate of charging I would have to run about 4-500w of panels to equal what your 200w are doing, I spoke to the solar Man last week and he reckons that 4 X 140's would be more than enough to do the job, My MPPT is the Victron 100/20, kind of wish I had bought the 150/50 version or bigger but my game plan changed after I bought it So if I want to get more panels means a bigger controller.

Those Energizer AA Lithiums hold about 1.82v each straight out of the pack and they work wonders for the TDI SL allowing it to run for a good 24 hours, Where as the normal ones last for about 4 to 6 hours.

 

[condor22]

The primary reason my charge rate is as it is, aint the battery, it's the solar panels. The cells work throughout the light spectrum from and including IR to UV, so they start first thing and go all day at varying rates. As we know there's plenty of UV round even on a dull day. The reason my battery works well, is down to charging properly and managing my use.

At midnight on the last full moon, I turned all loads off and the solar panels. My battery monitor showed the volts @ 12.6 after 15 minutes at rest (after watching TV and the heater being on.) The Amp reading was -0.2 which is the residual load from the monitor. So I turned the panels back on and the reading went to 0.0 and occasionally to +0.1A. So the panels were putting 0.2 amps in at midnight. (I have individual circuit breakers on each panel) In case someone asks, I used a headlight during this time, so there was absolutely no load

 

[ctxkid]

In case someone asks, I used a headlight during this time, so there was absolutely no load

lol no one did :lol:

 

[Nightjar]

This may seem to be far away from the KISS principle, however nothing is further from truth. Today all charging requirements are in one box, no tangled and lost leads, nothing misplaced. The 2018 version includes includes the following:
EPIRB
2 X Garmin Rino
300W inverter
240/12V battery charger
Chargers for SDC, GPZ, mobile, WM12, SP01
Connected to a 110AH deepcycle mounted under ute, charger by alternator while mobile.
Permanent roof solar + PVM
Portable fold up panels wired in series + MPPT. This is plugged into the box via Anderson plug while we are stationary and prospecting.
Have two Engels plugged in 39L (Freezer) 80L combo.

The "Box of tricks" began with the introduction of my trusty SD2100 around 1995?

Enter the GPX4500 version 2008

Evolved to this version when the SDC & GPZ were added to armament in 2018.

 

[Jaros]

I reckon if the cops pulled you over they would call the bomb squad !! It's all gotta go somewhere.
Nice layout.

 

[ctxkid]

doesn't get simpler than this
1 x 50amp lithium
3 x 3amp usb
1 x 2amp usb
1 x 200 watt pure inverter
i have to mount an victron mppt yet

done

 

[Jaros]

Nice neat package.

 

[Digger58]

Yes Jaros, that's what she said.

 

[Jabango]

Solar panel and second battery are no maintenance.

Generator equals maintenance, carrying fuel and noise.

The simple, clean non intrusive method is solar. For what you are wanting to charge, you dont need a large panel.

BTW I have all threee!

The solar panels are the real deal. I love them.